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Omega-3 Fatty Acids, Headaches and Brain Health

By Michael McBurney

Last week, we reviewed the study by MacIntosh and colleagues who randomized 67 subjects eating a typical high n-6 and low n-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acid diet (LCPUFA) were randomized to: 1) high n-3/low n-6 or 2) low n-6/average n-3 diets. Statistically significant changes in red blood cell (RBC) fatty acid levels were reported. It turns out the primary aim of the study was to assess the effect of dietary LCPUFA on chronic headaches, measured as the Headache Impact Test (HIT-6).

In a separate paper, Ramsden and colleagues report that increasing n-3 and reducing n-6 fatty acids reduces headache pain and improved quality of life in the 56 (of 67 patients) who completed the intervention. In intention-to-treat analysis, high n-3/low n-6 improved the HIT-6 score (-7.5 vs -2.1; p < 0.001), the number of headache days per month (-8.8 vs -4.0; p < 0.02), and the headache hours per day (-4.6 vs -1.2; p-0.01).